Green politics in China : environmental governance and state-society relations

Based on interviews with members of grassroots organisations, media and government institutions, Green Politics in China provides an in-depth and engaging account of the novel ways in which Chinese society is responding to its environmental crisis, using examples rarely captured in Western media or academia.

Joy Y. Zhang and Michael Barr explain how environmental problems are transforming Chinese society through new developments such as the struggle for clean air, low-carbon conspiracy theories, new forms of public fund raising and the international tactics of grassroots NGOs. In doing so, they challenge static understandings of state-society relations in China.

Green Politics in China is an illuminating and detailed investigation which provides crucial insights into how China is both changing internally and emerging as a powerful player in global environmental politics.

• List of abbreviations p. vii
• Acknowledgements p. viii
• Introduction p. 1
• Stepping into Muddy Water p. 3
• Shades of Green: Balancing Development and Social Stability p. 4
• 'Sustainable Development' with Chinese Characteristics p. 6
• Revolution from Within: Changing State-Society Relations p. 10
• A New 'United Front' p. 13
• Green Politics in China p. 16
• 1 Who Is to Blame? p. 19
• Chinese Climate Sceptics: Recounting Responsibility? p. 19
• China Is Not Happy p. 23
• The Unhappy Government: What Entitles You to Lecture Me? p. 23
• The Unhappy Society: Whom Should We Blame? p. 27
• Public Questioning of Authority p. 28
• Conclusion p. 32
• 2 Ways of Seeing p. 35
• Looking Through the Lens p. 37
• Making It Real: Encouraging the Public's Will to Act p. 39
• Recasting Individual Responsibility Through the Lens p. 43
• New Forms of Mobilization p. 45
• An Alternative View of Public Engagement p. 48
• The Power of Public Gaze p. 53
• Ways of Seeing and Ways of Weighing p. 59
• 3 Ways of Changing p. 62
• Clean Air with Chinese Characteristics p. 64
• The Politicisation of PM2.5 p. 66
• æI Monitor the Air for My Country' p. 70
• The Imagined Communities of Respiration p. 77
• 'From the Soil' Revisited p. 78
• Open Information and the Silent Apple p. 79
• A Clash of Values p. 82
• A Greener Apple on the Ground p. 88
• 4 Conformist Rebels p. 91
• Mitigating Administrative and Financial Constraints p. 91
• Unregistered But Not Underground p. 91
• Conceptual Labour with Real Cash p. 93
• The Symbiotic Relationship with Government p. 97
• The Government's Role Viewed from the Bottom Up p. 97
• Attaching the Government's Name p. 100
• ENGOs: A Rebel and a Conformist p. 104
• 5 The Green Leap Forward p. 107
• 'Policies from Above and Countermeasures from Below' p. 108
• In Five Years' Time ... p. 113
• What Goes Around Comes Around p. 116
• An Eco-Soft Power? p. 120
• The Politics of Harmony p. 123
• Conclusion: To Stomach a Green Society p. 127
• From Mass Unconsciousness to Citizen Stakeholders p. 128
• Speak Truth to Power p. 131
• Puzzled but Determined p. 133
• Concluding Thoughts p. 135
• References p. 137
• Index p. 157